Ron Paul Attacked by Conservative Leader Gary Bauer

Conservative leader Gary Bauer, best known for leading the Family Research Council and making a bid for the Republican presidential nomination, slammed Republican presidential candidate U.S. Rep. Ron Paul of Texas on Wednesday, arguing that the congressman from the Lone Star State was not a conservative in the mold of Ronald Reagan.

“I'm not a card-carrying member of the Ron Paul Fan Club,” noted Bauer, who is now with Our American Values and the Campaign for Working Families PAC. "While I admire his devotion to the idea of limited government, his views on many issues are out of step with the Republican Party. So much so that Paul once left the GOP and ran for president on the Libertarian Party ticket.

“Yet his supporters routinely claim that he is the only true Reagan conservative in the race. In fact, Paul even has a new ad out touting his support for Ronald Reagan. Thanks to the Perry campaign, we have been reminded of how Ron Paul really felt about Ronald Reagan,” continued Bauer. “In 1987, as he was preparing his third-party presidential bid, Paul formally resigned from the Republican Party and blamed, of all people, Ronald Reagan for his leaving.”

Bauer cited Paul’s letter of resignation from the Republican Party in which the congressman attacked “unprecedented deficits, massive monetary inflation, indiscriminate military spending, an irrational and unconstitutional foreign policy, zooming foreign aid, the exaltation of international banking, and the attack on our personal liberties and privacy” under the Reagan administration.

“As Ronald Reagan stared down the Soviet Union, rebuilt our military and fought a hostile Congress (I know because I was there!), Ron Paul ran for the exits,” insisted Bauer. “What exactly was Paul referring to when he wrote about Reagan's ‘irrational and unconstitutional foreign policy’? Did he mean rescuing American medical students held by Cuban commandos in Grenada? Did Paul oppose Reagan's military strikes on Libya after Gadhafi was implicated in the deaths of U.S. soldiers? When it came to the Soviet Union, Reagan's strategy was simple: ‘We win, they lose.’ Was Paul, like Ted Kennedy, an advocate for coexistence with the Soviets? These aren't rhetorical questions.

“One trait folks seemingly admire about Paul is his consistency. Well, I'll give him that. In condemning Ronald Reagan's ‘indiscriminate military spending,’ we can see now that his teaming up with radical leftist and conservative-hater Barney Frank to slash the defense budget is nothing new. Paul has been trying to slash our defense spending for years,” noted Bauer in conclusion. “I haven't gone back to check the votes, but I assume that Ron Paul supported Jimmy Carter's efforts to gut our military. Favoring small government is one thing; but providing for the defense of its citizens is the primary obligation of government at every level. It's not clear to me that Paul understands that or the world we live in.”

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Comments (49)

tt

10:06AM FEB 7TH 2012

Fraudulent article. When Paul wants to "slash" the military budget, it is reality slashing the INCREASED amount of spending on the military. But warhawks such as this author make it seem like Dr. Paul is for decimating the military. Straight up liar in my book is this author.

You know, the most telling indication that America's Statesman, Ron Paul, will be the next POTUS occurred when he became the 800-lb gorilla and elephant in the room. In other words the world awes him.
Therefore to humanity-haters, please ramp-up the ad hominem attacks and propagandistic omissions. It's free endorsement and perhaps miraculous.

All of the questions posed in the article are EASILY and PROUDLY answered. The question is, do you care to open your ears to hear them.
I suspect not..Those of you that will open your ears, I pre-emptively welcome you to our fantastic freedon movement endorsing the Peace President, Dr. Ron Paul 2012!

This is the same Gary Bauer that ran for president and called a press conference to confess that he cheated on his wife but none of the media even showed up for the press conference.How irrelevant is that? He attacked Buchanan as an isolationist. What Branch of the service did this little warmonger serve in? He's also on the AIPAC payroll. By the way Mr Bower, I doubt there are any Americans still naive enough to believe that We really invaded Grenada to save medical students.

Military keynesianism is not defense. It is just wasteful government spending directed at the military industrial complex. We spend more on our defense than the rest of the world combined. Ron Paul is right. We can defend our country without all the wasteful spending and entangling alliances. Quit the militarism and just defend our borders.

Right or Wrong doesn't matter anymore, huh? It doesn't matter if Ron Paul is RIGHT that we shouldn't be in 130 countries world wide, that those troops could defend our borders, that the money could be better spent shoring up the debt, or that the Defense budget itself is going to cause a default.

What matters is that this isn't part of YOUR definition of conservatism. Well, sir, your conservatism is WRONG, and I'm glad you don't want Rep. Paul in your clique of chickenhawk goons.

I think Gary Bauer should stick with being hypocritical in his own marriage - to wit - he was shagging an intern in his aborted (pun intended) Presidential run 12 years ago. When can we get a real debate about foreign policy - one that doesn't rely on hackneyed, overused neo-con boilerplate?

This article implies that Ron Paul wants to put our national security at risk by cutting the defense budget:

"Paul has been trying to slash our defense spending for years,” noted Bauer in conclusion. “I haven't gone back to check the votes, but I assume that Ron Paul supported Jimmy Carter's efforts to gut our military. Favoring small government is one thing; but providing for the defense of its citizens is the primary obligation of government at every level. It's not clear to me that Paul understands that or the world we live in.” "

Dr. Paul wants a strong national defense, not a strong international offense! He will not destroy our military, but focus it, make sure it is used for the defense of our country and for the aid of our country. Our armed services could be used better at home to make sure our borders are secure and see that disaster relief is brought quickly and responsibly.

As many other commenters have stated, this article shows an ignorant misrepresentation of Dr. Paul's philosophy of Liberty.

It doesnt seem like Paul left the republican party in the 80s, but more like the republican party left him. Everyone is afraid Ron Paul could win because both democrats and republicans love big government when it comes to their "party ideas". I believe that we should have the strongest military in the world, but I also believe that we spend to much moeny on the military and it gets wasted. Ron Paul is the only constituionalist running. (I like Cain also from what little I know and have heard form him!)

I thought Gary Bauer was a Christian. Aren't Christians supposed to go to their brothers and sisters and speak with them individually first if they have a problem? At least that is what Matthew 18 tells us. Bauer hasn't gone to Ron Paul, a devout Christian.

To boot, I wonder how Mr. Bauer reconciles his role as Undersecretary of Education for Reagan with his own oath of office to preserve, protect, and defend the constitution? After all, the Constitution doesn't enumerate the power of education to the federal government. Perhaps Mr. Bauer ought to get a real job in the private sector so he knows what it feels like to have paychecks taken from you to support an unconstitutional agency.

Yeah, as a Christian, it SICKENS me to see these so-called "Christians" who want to protect the unborn (as do I) but yet they think it's a-okay with God to kill innocent women and children as long as they have brown skin. There will be a special place in hell reserved for these warmongers.

My Bible says "Blessed are the peacemakers".
My savior was called "Prince of Peace".

You are correct, but there's a rub to it for Bauer (and legions of other professing Christians) that precedes his entire philosophy: They violate the 1st commandment to "have no other God's before me". In these peoples case, the state is their God. Thus, they see no internal contradiction in not following other biblical commandments and/or admonitions. Until they figure this one out, they'll always insert their foot in their mouths, hold mutually contradictory notions of truth in their minds and attempt to exercise their smug morality over those who refuse to submit to them, by violence, force and coercion if necessary.

It's a good thing Perry put up Ron's letter after Ron ousted him as a closet liberal & fake conservative. The letter clearly shows a principled Ron Paul who was disenfranchised with the Republican party, NOT Reagan's MESSAGE as candidate. He is so principled in fact that he still says the same things then, that he does now, with the exception of capital punishment. So why shouldn't he have run as a Libertarian. I mean, Reagan himself said that "the very soul of conservatism is libertariansim." Don't try to smear the man, you got nothing. But Perry, ooh boy, the man has dirt all over him.

Gary Bauer wants you to believe he is a real conservative. Real conservatives love every part of the Constitution not just the part they are interested in abusing. I am sick of neocons propaganda and lies. We will remember you who have made peaceful correction of our goverment, so difficult. You will be remembered as traitors and you should be ashamed of your treatment of Ron Paul and our Constitution.

"Ron Paul is one of the outstanding leaders fighting for a stronger national defense. As a former Air Force officer, he knows well the needs of our armed forces, and he always puts them first. We need to keep him fighting for our country."

"I believe the very heart and soul of conservatism is libertarianism."

- Ronald Reagan

This article is down right ridiculous. Did you not pay attention to the debate and hear in his own words why and how he came to leaving Reagan?

As a Progressive, i plan on voting for the Anti-War candidate. I fell for the hoax that is Obama, i wont make that mistake again. I'm registering as a Republican in the GOP primary and voting for Ron Paul. i truly believe he is sincere in his Anti-War Position.

Yes, you do that my friend, and tell all your other progessive buddies to do the same. We must unite for peace, and not let the neocons fearmonger about a threat to our American sovereignty that DOES NOT EXIST! War is not peace, no matter how you want to spin that Orwellian bs.

"Ron Paul is one of the outstanding leaders fighting for a stronger national defense. As a former Air Force officer, he knows well the needs of our armed forces, and he always puts them first. We need to keep him fighting for our country."

"I believe the very heart and soul of conservatism is libertarianism."

Because unlimited war is so conservative! Let's just blow all our money on bombing brown people, and once they're all dead, we can pat ourselves on the back and say how humanitarian we are for killing them. What a joke. Perhaps they haven't read the memo, but Hitler is dead. WWII is over. Let all these countries take care of themselves for now on. Sheesh...

Crash course on the phony “two party paradigm” and “media created tea party”

The media’s ignoring, ridicule and outright smearing of Ron Paul while bolstering other candidates illustrates nicely the two great modern schemes operating in American politics facilitated by the mainstream media – those being: the phony “two party paradigm” and the creation of the phony GOP “tea party”. First, the concept of a modern “tea party” came on board with the Ron Paul supporters back in 2007 during the campaign. Actual pounds of tea were to be dropped by a hovering blimp into Boston Harbor on the historic day of the original Boston tea party against British tyranny as a gesture of defiance to the status quo (lost of civil liberties; unending illegal wars; nation building; destruction of our currency; torture and extraordinary rendition; abuse of civil liberties under the bogus Patriot Act etc.). Party affiliation, national origin, race etc. wasn’t important – all were welcomed - only a love of liberty and a willingness to fight for it and hence among those veterans the movement is rarely regarded as “tea party” but instead the “liberty” or “freedom” movement and it is definitely not GOP or PERRY or Bachmann!!

In 2008 when the “dynamic duo” - McCain and his side kick - Palin got their bloodied grinded behinds handed back to them by Obama. This is exactly what the mainstream media had orchestrated for the previous year – and the rank and file GOP voters predictably bought it – they bought media served “stooge of the day” McCain and side kick hook line and sinker! I invite you to research progressive AP reporter Liz Soldoti’s coverage of McCain 2008 and see how she systematically built him up “straight talk express” to become the GOP front runner – the MSM knowing he was hopeless and would get creamed by Obama!

Immediately after the election in an attempt to do damage control the RNC/GOP and right leaning media embraced “tea party” to co-opt the movement for the progressive neo-cons – enter the right media ala FOX and the likes of social controlling neo-con personalities such as Rush Limbaugh; Glenn Beck and Sean Hannity. The left media, MSNBC etc. and their social controlling components: Keith Obermann; Chris Mathews and Rachel Maddow in an effort to maintain and reinforce the phony two party paradigm immediately hyped them “racists” and “secessionists” nut jobs stressing the “tea party” as against newly elected President Obama primarily because he was black!

Hence: the term “tea party” as currently hyped in the media is a creation of the mainstream media and simply equates to good old American progressive “neo-con”! The concept of “tea party” they propagate is a primary tool currently used to continue the “two party paradigm”. Anyone uninformed enough to buy in is being seriously played and hasn’t taken the effort to analyze the actual facts – just taking the media’s word for it like a good little boy or girl and maintain the “status quo”.

Allow me to go a little Taoist on you – the “real” tea party you hear about is not the “REAL” tea party!

Strange as it may seem, there is actually little socio-economic and political ideological difference between – lets say, MSNBC and FOX – only the illusion of one! Both the (so – called) right and left factions of American mainstream media are all globalists - wanting to maintain and expand American empire with all their corporate owners having direct BOD relationships with the giants in the military industrial complex such as: GE; Texaco; Chevron; Boeing; Lockheed Martin; Citigroup; Rockwell Automation; Chase, WorldCom, and JP Morgan; Halliburton, etc. and thereby financially benefit directly from the ongoing nation building and entrenched foreign occupations.

So the mainstream media as a whole created the current “GOP tea party” as is hyped today, to attempt to contain and control the actual legitimate non-partisan “liberty movement” (being the actual REAL “tea party” started by Ron Paul supporters in 2007) – it being a threat to the status quo and use the phony “two party paradigm” to help them do it. This is the illusion of two different parties counter balancing one another – please don’t say you can’t remember recently this spring when republican Senator McCain and democrat Senator Kerry went arm in arm bellowing for illegal war with Libya? Do you not find it is strange that Obama never changed Bush/Cheney policies regarding: torture; bailouts; WARS; Patriot Act and lost of civil liberties and abuse of American citizenry. Exactly - both parties want huge intrusive central authority – its just one side prefers to balloon the size of government with aggressive warfare and less social welfare and vice-versa. Americans are spoon fed the “two party paradigm” as a controlling device through the lame-stream media – that’s why globalist neo-cons like Bachmann and Perry are being hyped as “tea party” and that is why they are desperately trying to co-opt many of Ron Paul’s life-long political positions on things, such as: auditing the Federal Reserve.

For years have you scratched your head wondering - why are our representatives in DC doing this? Are they trying to destroy America? Unfortunately in a sense – they are. For the globalist in both parties it’s not about gaining a secure and prosperous American Republic; upholding liberty maintaining the supreme law of the land – the U.S. Constitution. It is totally about maintaining an economic empire for a select group of oligarchs using the American military - our blood and treasure! It’s about redistributing American wealth and technology and building “emerging” economies in China and India etc while de-industrializing America! It’s about destroying our education system with federal control so that our young people test dismally against students in the rest of the world in science and math! It’s about defending borders overseas while leaving our southern border in the USA open allowing for abuses of American citizens. We could go on and on about the mistreatment Americans suffer at the hands of a rogue government! However, you and I both know that throughout the process of the dismantling of America, the mainstream media tells you “its okay – remember back in 2008 when they spoon-fed us “don’t worry either top tier candidate, Obama or McCain will get us on track”! Now they are trying to force-feed us the candidates THEY CHOOSE again!

Yeah right! We know how that worked out!

The media is currently working overtime to convince voters that the candidates like: Perry; Romney and Bachmann are significantly different than President Obama – this is definitely pure BS! All of the 2012 candidates (in both parties) polling significant numbers nationally are deep in the pocket of international banking and the military industrial complex EXCEPT RON PAUL! This corrupt system needs an o-going puppet in the White House to keep bailing out criminals and keep this bogus war on terror going and ramped up bombing and saber rattling all awhile the media keeping the American people placated with the “two party paradigm” allowing for global elites to steal American national wealth and sovereignty! Ron Paul is the only candidate significantly different than Obama and therefore the ONLY ONE capable of beating him on issues that the majority of Americans heavily support (like ending: illegal wars; torture and illegal detention; abolishing the Patriot Act and Federal Reserve; stopping the abuses of the IRS and TSA and getting us out of NATO and NAFTA etc.)

The “establishment” is in a real bind – the media’s “ignore” phase for the “Ron Paul problem” hasn’t worked and the “discredit” phase is now underway. These types of tactics are standard procedure in any third world banana republic to marginalize legitimate opposition to the regime and status quo. They have NO place in a free representative Republic!
So, fellow Americans if by now you haven’t acknowledged that Obama is a corporate puppet you are in serious denial or part of the subversion! If you want things to continue under the rule of the global “banksters’ and “tanksters” – maintain the status quo and allowing tyranny to grow under the phony “two party paradigm” - vote for the spoon- fed media’s "top tier": Obama; Romney; Bachmann; Perry etc., but if you want things to truly change and have the assurance that you will have the right to be heard and not silenced then begin to restore America liberty now and support Ron Paul! He can’t be bought – and the establishment knows it! They must use every means available to attempt to marginalize him - hence the blackout, ridicule and smear! Check your states regulations for rules of primary voting and do whatever it takes (you may have to join the Republican Party) so that you can cast your primary vote for Ron Paul.

***“What exactly was Paul referring to when he wrote about Reagan's ‘irrational and unconstitutional foreign policy’?***

Gee maybe it was getting 200 Marines killed in a fatuous and arrogant use of US military power. Something we could have learned from 20 years later. Of course, RP never did have to learn that lesson did he... because he got it right the first time around.

***Favoring small government is one thing; but providing for the defense of its citizens is the primary obligation of government at every level. It's not clear to me that Paul understands that or the world we live in***

It's not the defense of American citizens Ron Paul objects to. It's the defense of Germans, Japanese, South Koreans, Iraqis, Kuwaitis, Italians... the list really does go on... paid for by the American taxpayer.

And if you don't have a problem with that, you need to learn that the world we live in requires being able to read a balance sheet... which Gary Bauer clearly has never learned how to do.

The Bauer name(with different spellings) has had close relations with the Rothchilds,Rockeffellers,and Hanoverian families for centuries.They are considered Blackbloods,meaning after the fall of Rome these families still held power through financial and government means,and some say,still do.

Watching the GOP debate last night was very frustrating. Ron Paul was barely given two minutes to answer questions. Nor was he talked about during any post debate discussions. It appeared to me, as though, that the only reason this debate was held was have a Rominey vs Perry showdown. Dr. Paul has been talking about the same issues for over 20 years. Why are we pretending like he doesn't exist? He's here, he's real, get used to it. This man cares about the near and distant future of the people of this country. I am 25 years old, and I am very concerned about my grandchildren and great grandchildren. If something is not done soon, America will never be Land of The Free. We need action. We need real passion. American Needs Ron Paul.

yea this is more persuasion, not journalism. How can you write about Reagons out of control spending and war mongering like it was necessary? What about the time Reagan bombed hondurus? oh yea, you forgot that one. I sure like the quote from above about principals.

“What exactly was Paul referring to when he wrote about Reagan's ‘irrational and unconstitutional foreign policy’?"

Two words: Operation Cyclone

Look up the government white papers for yourself. Talk about a CIA/MI6 program coming back to bite us in the butt, along with killing 3000 on 9/11. Are you PROUD of that foreign policy? Only sickos would be proud.

Then we had the Iran-Contra Affair. Or, are we supposed to forget about that too?

The crony capitalism has dictated our foreign policy, much to the detriment of our young men and women in uniform along with all that collateral damage (death and maiming of innocent men, women and children) we inflict along with way. Our crony war profiteers sell us destructive weapons every day that cause more collateral damage against the innocent.

I would rather go back to the ancient war policy - where the leader of the nation also had to be front and center leading each and every battle. We wouldn't have many wars if the war mongers had to risk their OWN lives.

Mr. Bauer is obviously many things. First a person who has never gone to war and seen what happens there. Second he is a true neoconservative(war monger) of the George Bush variety. Third he has no concept of what national defense means. Fourth he conveniently forgot that Reagan change after his assassination attempt and never went against the military industrial complex after that. Sadly Reagan became as bad a president as he was an actor and he valued his own life more than his rhetoric principles. Just another pettifogger?

Bauer correctly states the reasons why Ron Paul was dissatisfied with Reagan's policies in office, higher taxes, bigger government, growing the industrial military complex. He Left out the Lebanon fiasco and what did Reagan's support of the Mujaheddin against the Soviet Union get us? 9/11 "We win, they lose" I don't think so, in war everyone loses something. I will vote for Ron Paul over any of the other "same of the old failing policies" of the other candidates.

Perhaps he was referring to Reagan sending Marines into Lebanon where they were blown to bits. Sorry, that was a sort of erratic move. However, Paul has complimented Reagan on being strong enough to recognize his mistake and remove them rather than doubling down.

I find it interesting that the author laments everything reagan did that was NON-conservative, tremendous defecits included. It is also funny that he completely ignores how the soviet union was bound to fail from its infancy, yet Reagan beat them. How? We went to no war during his administration. We did, however, somewhat reduce regulatory burden and increase part of what one might call a capitalist idea. Strange, capitalism defeats communism? Sounds like nearly everything Ron Paul says and argues for...

It is certain to me that not only does this moron not understand the world we live in, he does understand what being a oppressive overweening fool means... for that is what he is. If he thinks the United States and a wildly over-expansive and considerably unaffordable warfare program that exists with a foundation having nexus between our hubris and our greed, he needs to to learn to live life with a bit more humility.

Reagan himself expressed regret for many of the reasons Ron Paul listed. The Libya one being one of the more famous accounts. In other cases, such as the congressman being innocent also proved to be true, although not for another 8 years.

All the things Ron Paul listed were issues and positions that Reagan himself held and was elected on.

What amazes me is where do these people get off attacking someone for putting principles over party? Isn't that basically saying that people shouldn't stick to principles, but should rather say and have whatever positions the GOP wants them to have? Because I personally consider that part of the problem.

If a man is too principled for your tastes, it's because you lack them.

I think the key thing to understand here is that Dr. Paul DOES understand that the defense of America's citizens is the PRIMARY obligation of government. What are we doing in Iraq and Afghanistan? Why are we still in Germany, Japan & South Korea? How is spreading ourselves far, wide and thin in our best interest, as our own borders are left open?
It is not isolationism to bring our troops home and end these wars, nor is it a threat to our security. Much more can be done with countries like Iran through trade and talking then by sanctions and fighting, and Ron Paul knows this better then anyone.
Not to mention we are borrowing from China to pay for our massive presence, when its been proved in our hunt for bin Laden that small special forces and Intel does the job better, quicker and more efficiently.
Under Paul, the troops would come home from around the world, allowing them to spend their money here instead of abroad, boosting the local economy. These troops can be used to protect our borders and insist in disaster relief, phasing out ineffective programs like FEMA.

This plan, along with his stance on other issues, makes sense to me and millions of others. Ron Paul is the best chance we have to bring about real change in America!

Blah, blah, blah... Ronald Reagan spoke a good game, but the results were not what he spoke of. Increased taxes, increased debt, military adventurism... Same deal with the platform that George Bush ran on where he was going to end nation building. Reagan got away with it because the effects of destroying the currency and leaving the gold standard were a long way away. Reagan said something about a great country that leaves the gold standard never remains great. That's a strong statement that he did nothing about...